Chhole without onion and garlic

I've become a fan of onion-garlic free food. I have nothing against onions and garlic, but sometimes, especially in an ill-ventilated kitchen, the smells can be rather overwhelming. After marathon cleaning and spraying and polishing sessions, I have this tendency to avoid cooking with strong, pungent smelling stuff in the kitchen. For about a day or tow.

I saw this recipe on Tarla Dalal's website. The ingredient list made me curiouser and curiouser. Cabbage and lauki in Chhole?? It was then the tail end of summer, I was rather fortunate to find white pumpkin in the friendly neighbourhood vegetable store. I just had to try this out.

This recipe was wonderful. I think I overcooked the white pumpkin, but the end result was a smooth, velvety, creamy gravy, that was wonderfully spicy. The first time around, I felt that the flavour of cloves was overwhelming. After that I reduced the amount of cloves (and red chillies too) called for in the recipe, and it was just fine.

The OH had some. It was fine, he said. Was this a new recipe? I casually mentioned that there was cabbage and white pumpkin in the chhole. He looked so horrified. Until I reminded him that he had eaten a generous serving, and had seconds too. And he graciously consented to let me make it again.

Chhole without onion/garlic

2 cups soaked chana (chick peas)
1 cup white pumpkin or bottle gourd (doodhi/lauki peeled and chopped)
2 tsp cumin seeds
1 bay leaf
1 cup grated cabbage
1 tsp chilli powder
½ tsp dry ginger powder
1 tsp dry mango powder (amchur)
3 tbsp chopped coriander
2 tbsp cream (or milk)
2 tomatoes (cubed)
3 tbsp oil
Salt to taste
4 tbsp chopped coriander leaves (garnish)

Chhole masala
2 tsp whole cumin seeds
4 tsp coriander seeds
2 dry red chillies
2 cloves
3 peppercons
1 cardamom
1" piece cinnamon
3 tsp dried pomegranate seeds



Dry roast each of the ingredients for the chhole masala individually. Grind them to a powder and keep aside.
Pressure cook the chana with 1-1/2 cups water and the white pumpkin/lauki with a little salt.
If using canned beans, cook the lauki/pumpkin with a little salt and water. Add chana, bring to a boil. Simmer for 5 minutes.
Heat the oil in a pan. Temper with cumin seeds and bayleaf.
Add the cabbage and sauté till it lightly browns.
Add in the roasted and chhole masala, and other powder spices (ginger, amchur)and coriander.
Add the cooked chana and white pumpkin along with the water.
Adjust salt to taste.
Simmer for ten minutes.
Stir in the cream (or milk), add the tomatoes, mix well and simmer for two minutes before removing from heat.
Serve hot garnished with coriander.

Soup, salad and some indulgence

Weekday lunches, are something the other half and I look forward to. On weekdays, lunch is the most relaxed and 'No-don't'-free meal. By the time the OH comes home for lunch, the littlest one is fed and watered, and not very likely to be noisy. If we're very lucky, she might even be asleep, and we might even have a 'real' conversation.

Lunch is one meal where I can try something different, and not worry about whether it would suit little palates. Lunch is when I can really experiment. And try to make something elaborate or fancy. Or in other words, food that makes the other-half take skeptical or even outright suspicious looks or sniffs.

And since I'm focusing on eating healthy, I thought of making a soup and salad lunch.

I'd bookmarked this recipe from the FatFree Vegan Kitchen. As usual, I didn't have half the ingredients in hand, didn't have the enthusiasm to trudge through gale and snow to a store, and decided to make do with what I had. I garnished this soup with fresh roasted and crushed coriander seeds. That acted as a thickener, and gave the soup a lovely spicy boost.

Lentil and Vegetable soup
serves 2

1/4 cup lentils (whole masur dal)
1 carrot (peeled and sliced thick)
1 medium potato (peeled and cubed)
1/4 cup cauliflower florets
1 large onion (sliced fine)
1/4 tsp black pepper powder
1/4 tsp turmeric
1 large tomato (chopped fine)
1 tbsp coriander seeds
salt to taste


Wash lentils, and soak for 30 minutes.
In a pressure cooker, cook lentils. carrots, onions, potato, cauliflower, salt, turmeric and pepper with 4 cups water, for about 7 minutes.
Roast coriander seeds till fragrant, and crush to a coarse powder.
Add chopped tomato to the lentil mix, and simmer for for 10 minutes or till the tomato is cooked through.
Season with coriander powder and adjust salt if needed.
Serve hot.

After the soup was done, I wanted to try something new. I thought I'd try my hand at a terrine. The rice was rather dry. Next time I would like to toss some cottage cheese with the rice, and see if that would make it less dry.

Potato and Rice Terrine
serves 2

1 large Potato (Peeled and sliced)
1/2 cup cooked rice
1/2 cup vegetable stock


Heat oven to 180ºC.
Line 2 ramekins with Baking parchment.
Warm vegetable stock (about 40ºC)
Soak potato slices in vegetable stock for 15-20 minutes.
Remove slices from stock. Reserve stock.
Arrange a few slices of potato in the bottom of each ramekin. (reserve 2 large potato slices for later use)
Fill each ramekin with cooked rice.
Cover ramekins with baking parchment, and bake for about 20 minutes.
Drizzle reserved stock over the rice in both ramekins.
Cover with reserved potato slice.
Cover ramekins again with baking parchment, and bake for 20-25 minutes.
Invert over a plate and serve hot.

And now that our lunch was so wonderfully healthy, I just had to add some indulgence.

No-fuss Mango Dessert
serves 2

1 cup + 2 tbsp mango pulp
1/2 cup low fat Mascarpone cheese
Sugar to taste (optional)


Whisk Mascarpone, 1 cup mango pulp and sugar (if using) till smooth and the mixture starts to thicken.
Divide equally into dessert bowls.
Top with reserved mango pulp.
Chill for an hour.
Serve cold.

Egg Curry

One of the first thing that someone tells me, once they hear that I'm from India, is "I love butter chicken." The sum total of interest in Indian cuisine seems limited to butter chicken. There are people here who actually believe that I eat 'butter chicker kare' for breakfast, lunch and dinner. I can't get them to understand that I'm vegetarian, or that there's more to Indian food that 'Butter Chicken'.

And after being asked about Butter Chicken once too often, I decided that I have to try making a egg or paneer version of the dish. The results weren't anything to blog about. Unfortunately, most of the gravies/masalas that taste awesome with some meat based dishes, don't work that well with vegetable substitutes.

After a lot of trial and error, I earmarked one set of proportions that seemed to work well with eggs or paneer. But it still lacked a certain something. One fine day, as I was making my monthly grocery list, I saw that my grocer had listed a new item, "Chicken Curry masala". Also, by this time, I was so bugged with the absurdly limited vegetable and spice options here that I was willing to try something new. I was willing to try ANYTHING new. So I ordered one packet of the masala. The next time I made a paneer dish, I ignored the usual 'Kitchen King' and Garam Masalas, and seasoned it with the Chicken Curry masala. A was quite impressed. He had no clue what had gone into it, but said it tasted wonderful. I tried it again with Egg Curry, and the result was simply fabulous. I should mention that it tastes wonderful with other vegetable gravies too. Chicken curry masala is a pantry staple now. Always on hand to jazz up a dish when we get bored with the same things over and over again.

Egg Curry

8 Eggs (hard boiled, peeled and slit with a sharp knife)
1 tbsp ginger, garlic paste -
2 large onion
2 large tomato
1 tsp kasuri methi
1 tsp chilly powder
1 tsp coriander powder
1/4 tsp turmeric
1/2 tsp cumin powder
3/4 tsp chicken curry masala
3 tbsp cup cream
2 tbsp unsalted butter
6 cashewnuts paste
1 tsp khus-kush
3 tbsp oil
salt to taste



Grind onion to a smooth paste. Puree the tomatoes.
Soak cashewnuts and khus-khus. Drain excess water and grind to a smooth paste.
Heat a heavy bottom kadhai. Quickly toast the kasuri methi and keep aside.
Heat oil in the kadhai. Add onion paste and saute till oil separates.
Add ginger-garlic paste, and saute till the raw smell is gone.
Add all spice-powders (except chicken curry masala) and saute for a minute.
Add tomato puree and khuskhus-cashew paste.
Adjust salt to taste.
Crush roasted kasuri methi to fine powder and add to kadhai.
Bring the gravy to a simmer. Add eggs to the gravy and continue to simmer.
When gravy starts to thicken, add chicken curry masala powder and simmer for a minute more.
Remove kadhai from heat, and stir in butter and cream.

Serve hot.

Papad ki Subzi

One advantage of living in the backwoods is that you tend to be quite innovative. People had told me before I moved here that life in Japan wasn't easy for a vegetarian. And these were people who used Osaka, Kobe and Tokyo as a benchmark. But nothing prepared me for this little town. Vegetable choices are rather limited throughout the year. For someone who spent the last 5 years in Singapore, where every veggie was available all through the year, this was a bit of a challenge.

But there is a silver lining to every cloud. The one really wonderful good to come out of this is that, A, the ultimate gourmet, is willing to try anything new. With very little fuss. Of course, I still can't get him to eat karela or soya chunks, but he's not half as fussy as he used to be.

There are days when I look at the veggies I have at home, and want something totally new to eat. Those are the days when I'm totally in the mood for something new.... anything new. One of those days my mind went into a kind of trance. I thought:
What dish I was most in the mood to eat: pittla.
What did I like best about it: the texture of papads soaked in the pittla base.
Does A like papads: yes.
Does A like the texture of soaked papads: yes.
Will A eat most veggies in his favourite onion-tomato gravy: yes.
What can go wrong: not much.
What's the worst that could happen: Leftovers.
The odds sounded good, and I thought to myself, "nothing ventured nothing gained".

And fortifying myself with that other pithy homilies, I went forth to do battle. I whipped up my favourite gravy, fried up some papads, broke them, stirred them into the hot gravy, let it soak, and served it up with rice.

First thing A asked was expected. "What on earth is this?"... I tried to explain in detail, but he cut me short. "Basically you're telling me there's papads, onion and tomatoes in this, right? Then it can't be too badly messed up, what?"

How can I ever argue with such brilliant logic??

The verdict was favourable too. I didn't have ANY leftovers. I couldn't ask for more, could I?

Papad ki Subzi
serves 2

4 medium sized papads (fried and broken into medium sized pieces)
1 large onion (sliced fine)
1 large tomato (sliced)
1 tsp coriander powder
1 tsp cumin powder
1/4 tsp turmeric
1/4 tsp chili powder
1 pinch hing
1 tsp cumin seeds
2 tbsp oil
1 tsp garam masala/kitchen king
salt to taste
1 tbsp chopped coriander leaves


Heat 2 tbsp oil and temper with cumin seeds and hing.
Add onion slices, and fry till lightly browned.
Add tomato slices, and cook till oil separates.
Add all spice powders and stir for 2 mins.
Adjust salt to taste.
Add papad pieces to gravy and stir.
Take pan off heat, and transfer contents to serving bowl.
Garnish with coriander leaves.
Cover and keep aside. Let the papads soak for at least 30 minutes before serving.
Serve hot.

Notes:
Garlic or other such spiced papads work best. Plain appalams will do in a pinch, but the masala varieties are awesome.
Do fry papads for this one. For some reason, plain roasted or microwaved papads just don't soak in the gravy the way fried ones do.

Baingan ka Saalan

What's a good choice for a nice hot dish on a dreary winter's day when one is stuck indoors? Nayeem's patented biriyani, of course! What goes well with a simple biriyani?? Baingan ka saalan!

I love Vee's recipe for the saalan base. Simple, uncomplicated and absolutely acceptable as a side dish on festival/vratam days, because it totally leaves out onions and garlic.

Baingan-ka-khatta saalan

serves 4

1/2 kg baby eggplants (slit from base to crown)
1/4 cup peanuts (roasted)
1/4 cup coconut (slightly roasted till golden)
3 tbsp grated ginger
1 tbsp sesame seeds (slightly roasted till golden)
1 pinch hing
1/2 cup curd (whisked smooth)
1/2 tsp turmeric powder
1 tsp Cumin powder
1/2 tsp coriander powder
1/2 tsp tamarind concentrate (or extract from 1 marble sized ball of tamarind)
1/2 tsp garam masala powder
5 tbsp oil
salt to taste

Heat oil, add hing and lightly saute the eggplants. Keep aside.
Make a fine paste of peanuts, coconut, ginger and sesame seeds.
Add paste to hot oil and fry till oil seperates.
Add turmeric, cumin, coriander powder to the curd and mix well.
Add curd mix and salt to the saalan and cook for 3 minutes.
Add eggplants, salt and cook covered covered for 5 minutes.
Add tamarind and garam masala.
Add water to adjust gravy to required consistency.
Simmer for 10 minutes or till eggplants are cooked through.
Serve hot.

Another quick fix with the same gravy:
Make gravy as above, and instead of eggplant, add a packet (1/2 kg) of frozen peas, and let it cook as above.
I've also tried this with soaked soya chunks. Not bad at all, I must say.

Chhole in a jiffy

My little one has started to like Chhole... Glory be!

But she does ask me for chhole at the drop of a hat. Out of the blue she's likely to ask me for some, just as I'm about to start cooking. I have started to store cans of Garbanzo or Ceci beans just on the off chance that I'm asked to make some chhole in a hurry.

This is my solution, very simple uncomplicated, light and very delicious chhole. Takes all of 10 minutes to make! And best of all, no ginger, garlic, onion or tomatoes. This brings down prep time to almost nil. And best of all, very little oil!

Sounds too simple, doesn't it? But it's still very very yummy!

When I do plan to make chhole in advance, I soak some chana for a few hours, and cook it with some salt before following this recipe.

Quick and Tasty Chhole
serves 3


1 cup chana, soaked overnight and cooked with salt, OR,
2 cans Garbanzo or Ceci beans

1 tbsp oil
1" cinnamon
3-4 cloves
2-3 black peppercorns
1 bay-leaf
1 tsp cumin seeds
1 pod green cardamom
1 tbsp coriander powder
1 tbsp cumin powder
1 tsp dry mango powder
1/4 tsp turmeric
1/2 tsp chilli powder
1 tbsp Chhole/Chana masala
2 medium potatoes (peeled and cubed)
salt to taste

Drain beans, if using canned, and rinse. Keep aside.
Mix all powders (coriander powder, cumin powder, dry mango powder, turmeric, chilli powder, chana masala ) with a little water and make a smooth paste.
Heat oil. Temper with cinnamon, bay leaf, cumin seeds, cardamom, black pepper and cloves.
Add the masala paste. Add a little water if mixture is too thick.
Fry on low flame till oil separates.
Add chana, potatoes and cover with just enough water.
Adjust salt to taste.
Cover and simmer till potatoes are done (about 7-8 minutes).
Take 1/2 cup cooked chana and potatoes and mash well. Add it back to the simmering chhole.
Adjust consistency with a little more water if required.
Simmer for 2 minutes.
Garnish with chopped coriander leaves.

Dal Dhokli

All this cold and gloomy weather does inspire me get some fancy cooking done. Fancy?? Hmm.. at our place, anything other than sambar, rasam and vegetable gets classified as fancy cooking!

The first time I tried dal-dhokli was when a neighbour made some for me in Singapore. And I was well and truly hooked. What I like best about is that it's a one dish meal. Filling and extremely satisfying. Flavourful, yet not too spicy-hot for my three-year old. It doesn't show in the pic, but it's full of what I call desi-pasta, chappati dough cut into small pieces and boiled in the dal base. Served with rice and sliced onions, it can be quite a heavy meal.

Absolutely nutritious and delicious too!

Dal Dhokli
serves 4

2/3 cup wheat flour
1/2 tsp ajwain
salt to taste
water to knead

Make a tight dough with all the above (like for pooris).
Roll into slightly thick chappatis (about 2-3mm)
Cut chappatis into 1" strips. Make diagonal cuts and shape like diamonds.
Keep aside.

1.5 cups yellow moong dal
1/2 tsp turmeric
1 onion (chopped fine)
1 tomato (chopped fine)
1/2 cup groundnuts (cooked)
1" piece ginger (grated)
1 green chili (or more, to taste)
2 cloves garlic
1 tsp mustard seeds
1/2 tsp cumin seeds
1 pinch asafetida (hing)
1 tsp coriander powder
1 tsp cumin powder
1/2 tsp garam masala
Salt to taste
Oil for tempering
water, if required, to adjust consistency
chopped coriander leaves

Wash and cook moong dal with turmeric, in plenty of water.
After dal is cooked, stir well till its a smooth blend.
Heat oil. Temper with mustard seeds, cumin seeds and hing. Add whole or chopped green chili.
Add onion and saute till it turns transparent. Add ginger and garlic and continue to saute till the raw smell is gone.
Add tomatoes and cook for 3-4 minutes.
Add cumin, coriander and garam masala powders.
Add the cooked dal and groundnuts.
Adjust salt to required taste.
Bring to a boil, adding water to adjust consistency.
Add the cut chappati bits, a few at a time.
Cover and simmer for 15 minutes, or till the chappati bits are cooked through.
Garnish with chopped coriander leaves.
Serve hot

Notes:
Ideal consistency, prior to adding chappati pieces, would be slightly thin, like tomato sauce. It tends to thicken as it simmers.
I use whole green chilies. It imparts flavour, and at the same time, doesn't make the dish too spicy. Easier to discard if one doesn't want to bite into a piece by mistake :)

Dinner party

This must be the most mixed crowd I've ever catered for! A invited a few of the research students from the Univ to dinner. I cooked for a group comprising of a Slovakian, Hungarian, German, Korean, Malaysian, and of course, Indians... US!

Since it's been a while since we last entertained (all of 3 weeks) I decided to make something slightly fancy. And with the mixed crowd in mind, also considering that the Europeans and the Korean had never eaten Indian food, I had to plan a good menu... balancing out the mild with the unbelievably hot.

The menu I finally came up with has to be one of my best ones to date. Naans, Tandoori salad, Aloo matar, Biriyani, Raita, Malai Kofta and Ice-cream for dessert. I decided on store bought naans as I don't have an oven... yet..
The recipes for biriyani, raita and aloo matar have been blogged here before. The only change, I dunked in about 250 gms of green peas along with the potatoes, and cooked it the same way.

Malai Koftas
serves 8


Koftas as made in this recipe.
Optional: Stuff koftas with chopped cashewnuts and raisins before frying them.

3 big onions
4 cloves garlic
1" piece ginger
1 cup milk powder (or khowa)
1/2 cup almonds (soaked and peeled)
1/4 cup milk
2 tsp garam masala
1" cinnamon
1 bay leaf
2 cloves
1 pod cardamom
1/2 cup cream
2 tbsp oil
salt to taste

Peel onions, garlic and ginger. Boil till onions are clear. Reserve water used in boiling. Cool and grind to a smooth paste. Keep aside.
Grind almonds to a smooth paste with milk. Keep aside.
Heat oil. Add dry spices and let them splutter.
Add onion paste and fry for 3 minutes.
Make a smooth paste of milk powder and 1/2 cup reserved cooking water. Add to the onion paste and simmer for 5 minutes.
Add ground almonds, Garam masala and adjust salt to taste. Simmer for 3-4 minutes till well combined. Dilute with reserved water to adjust to desired consistency.
Arrange fried koftas on serving platter.
Pour hot gravy over them just before serving. Garnish with cream.

Tandoori Salad
serves 4



100 gms Paneer
1 big tomato (very firm)
1 big onion
1 red capsicum
1 green capsicum
1 yellow/orange capsicum

For the marinade:
1/4 cup olive oil
2 tsbp lemon juice
2 cloves garlic (ground)
salt to taste

Peel onions. Deseed Capsicums.
Cut paneer, and vegetables into equal sized chunks.
Blend ingredients for marinade till well combined.
Let vegetables and paneer marinate for at least 2 hours.
Grill in batches for 5-7 minutes (turning when they start to brown)
Alternately, bake in topmost rack of oven at 180C till browned.
Skewer before serving.
Serve hot.

Leftover-rice Koftas

Have you ever opened your fridge and found lots of leftover rice? Here's a nice way to use it up. I looked for recipes using leftover rice, and didn't really find anything all that great. Finally found one for koftas, but again, more than half the ingredients needed for that aren't to be found in this neck of the woods. So one just improvised, and the results were great!

The beauty of this kind of kofta is that it goes well with any kind of gravy. I tried it with a boiled onion and nuts gravy, the regular tomato-onion gravy, and even with palak gravy. It went well with them all. And the little one even liked the kofta by itself.

I won't bother with gravy recipes in this one. Go ahead and make whatever gravy sounds good to you.

Leftover-rice koftas
makes 12 koftas

2 cups cooked rice
1 big potato (parboiled, peeled and mashed)
1/2 tsp chili powder
1 pinch turmeric
salt to taste
oil for frying

Mix the rice, mashed potato, turmeric, chili powder and salt, well. Don't mix it so hard that you end up mashing the rice.
Divide into 12 portions, and shape as desired (as perfect rounds, cylinders, or even flattened like a tikki)
Deep fry in oil till well browned, about 4 minutes per batch.
Arrange koftas on a serving dish, and pour piping hot gravy over it not more than 5 minutes before serving.

Simple, what?

Yummy Biriyani dinner

Hooray! Pictures at last.

We'd invited our dear friend AS for dinner last night. And I thought I'make a nice spicy biriyani a-la-Nayeem. Nayeem makes the best biriyani in the whole world. Anything else takes a pales to an insignificant second place. Of course, my effort wasn't too bad, but it was nowhere near Nayeem's level of utter perfection! We miss you lots, Nayeem. Actually, we miss biriyani more than we miss you :) ... er.... foot in mouth happened there.

Arun of course, would never be content with just a salad or a raitha to go with his biriyani. So I made a nice dish of baby-potatoes in gravy. And of course raitha. And I know it all tasted good coz we had no leftovers. And my little one actually ate ALL her potatoes!

I love N's biriyani recipe for it's sheer simplicity. No overly elaborate cooking procedures! And because the biriyani and raitha had plenty of onions, I decided to leave out onions in the gravy for the potatoes.

This must be one of the more elaborate meals I have cooked since we came to Tsuruoka. It doesn't compare with some of the 6-7 course dinners for 25 that I have made in Singapore. A tiny kitchen does dampen culinary enthusiasm!

Baby potatoes in gravy
serves 4


20 baby potatoes
1 tsp cumin seeds (jeera)
1 tsp jeera powder
1 tsp dhania powder
1 tsp garam masala powder
3 tbsp tomato paste
1 pinch hing
1 tbsp + 3 tspb oil
salt to taste
1 cup water

Wash and scrub potatoes. Parboil in salted water. Peel when done.
Heat 3 tbsp oil. Add jeera seeds and hing and let it splutter.
Add the potatoes and fry till very lightly browned. Keep aside.
Mix the masala powders with about 3 tbsp water.
Heat 1 tbsp oil. Add the masala mix, and fry till oil begins to float on top.
Add tomato paste and fry for about 2 minutes.
Add potatoes.
Add water to bring gravy to desired consistency.
Add salt to taste.
Cover and cook on a low flame for about 15 minutes.
Garnish with chopped coriander leaves before serving.


Biriyani,
serves 4


2 cups basmati rice
1 big onion (sliced)
1.5 tsp ginger garlic paste
2 cups cut mixed vegetables (beans, peas, carrots, cauliflower)
1/4 tsp turmeric powder
1 tsp chilli powder (or to taste)
1 stick cinnamon
5 cloves
1 bay leaf
1 tsp cumin seeds (jeera)
2 tbsp tomato paste
Salt to taste
Oil for frying


Wash and soak basmati in 4 cups water.
Heat oil. Add Jeera and let it splutter.
Add sliced onions and fry till onions start to brown.
Add ginger garlic paste, and continue frying till the raw smell of garlic is gone.
Add the cut vegetables. Add salt to taste.
Add chilli powder and turmeric and saute for 3 minutes. Add a little water to ensure that vegetables cook fully.
Add tomato paste, and continue to cook till oil starts to float on top.
Heat oil. Lightly fry cinnamon, cloves and bay leaves in turn till fragrant.
Add whole spices to the rice.
Cook till almost done.
(I used a microwave rice cooker. 12 minutes on high power should do)
Drain rice in a colander. Rinse with cold water to stop it cooking further.
Layer rice and vegetables in a dish, starting and ending with vegetables.
Cover with cheesecloth. Close dish with a steel or any metal plate large enough to cover it completely.
Place a pot of boiling water on top of the plate.
This is a very simple method of 'dum' cooking.
The rice finishes cooking with the juices from the vegetable mixture, making the biriyani quite juicy.
Leave aside for about 30-45 minutes.
When ready to serve, take a serving spoon and mix the rice and vegetables well.

Raitha
serves 4
1 big onion (finely chopped)
1 big tomato (finely chopped)
2 tbsp chopped coriander leaves
2 cups beaten curds/plain yogurt
salt to taste
1/2 tsp jeera powder
1/2 tsp chaat masala

Toss chopped vegetables together with salt to taste.
Gently stir in beaten curds/yogurt.
Add jeera powder and chaat masala.
Serve chilled.

Aloo-dhania

Yesterday I sat in front of a pile of baby-potatoes thinking of what I could do with them. I was totally bored with the usual jeera-aloo, dum-aloo, aloo-mutter etc... And a quick check of the refrigerator revealed a generous amount of coriander leaves that needed to be used in a hurry. So here's what I came up with.

I used my little pressure cooker for the entire process. Less messy, and just one utensil to wash!

And imagine, Arun said it smelled like something from a 5-star hotel restaurant... high praise indeed!

Aloo-Dhania

20 baby potatoes (par-boiled in salted water and peeled)
1 large onion
1 small tomato
3 closes garlic
1 tsp dhania powder
1 tsp jeera powder
1 bunch coriander leaves
1 1/2 tsp garam masala
Salt to taste
1 tsp jeera seeds
1 pinch hing
Oil for frying
1-2 cups water
1 tbsp coriander leaves (finely chopped)

Heat oil. Add jeera seeds and hing. Stir-fry the potatoes with a little salt till lightly browned. Keep aside.
Grind onion, garlic and the dhania and jeera powders to a fine paste.
Heat oil. Fry the masala till it loses its raw smell.
Grind tomato and coriander leaves to a fine paste. Add this to the onion masala.
When oil begins to separate, add the potatoes. Add salt to taste.
Add water to adjust gravy to desired consistency. Add garam masala.
Cover and cook for about 15 minutes. Garnish with chopped coriander leaves.

Serve hot with Chappatis or pulav.